


Demons Are Not Soft for Kittens, How Dare You, Ngk-

by IneffableDoll



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Aziraphale is a bastard too, Banter, Cats, Crowley falls in love with a bastard cat, Cute, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Humor, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), Is this crack?, M/M, Much Ado references because I am insatiable, Queerplatonic Relationships, Rating for Language, Soft Crowley (Good Omens), bastard cat loves him back, it's a whole thing, it's just soft, old married couple vibes, so much banter and teasing, their relationship can be read however you want to
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-19
Updated: 2020-06-19
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:15:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24809869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IneffableDoll/pseuds/IneffableDoll
Summary: Crowley finds an adorable stray kitten (no, it’s not adorable, it’s ANNOYING) and saves it (only prolonging its misery, very demonic, really) and needs to find a way for Aziraphale to take it in (he’s not taking care of the damn thing).Not all goes to plan.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 36
Kudos: 163
Collections: Aspec-friendly Good Omens





	Demons Are Not Soft for Kittens, How Dare You, Ngk-

**Author's Note:**

> Credit to [Luinlothana](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luinlothana/pseuds/Luinlothana) for commenting the idea behind this. There are a couple of references here to my fic [What’s Your Favorite Animal?](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23070400) but it can be read stand-alone well enough.  
> This was supposed to be like, a thousand words, but it got out of hand. Was a ton of fun, though. I wrote most of it while procrastinating my finals.

“What is making that infernal – blessed – fucking _obnoxious_ sound?”

Crowley pulled up short where he was swaggering down the streets of Mayfair. It was hot as Somewhere – not Hell, even demons favored air-con – and pedestrians crowded the pavement like tourism was going out of style. Between the incessant smell of petrol, the honking and skidding of ugly modern cars that had nothing on his gorgeous Bentley, and the chatter of…ugh, _Americans_ …was the softest, barest squeaking of a hinge in desperate need of some WD-40.

Some other day, Crowley might’ve simply ignored it, but he’d gotten transcendently bored since getting the proverbial pink slip from Hell, and demons must get their entertainment somewhere.

It crossed his mind that he may have invented squeaky hinges _. Nonetheless._

He turned on his heel and walked the block again, keeping his sharp ears open for the small sound and scanning around for anything that might make a squeaking noise. It was a townhouse block with a number of brick fronts and rows of pathetic windowsill foliage that needed a good talking to; all the doors were closed, and he couldn’t pinpoint where that tiny whine was coming from.

He absently kicked a metal gate outside one home in vague annoyance, stubbing his toe in the process, and swearing loud enough for those nearby to shoot him withering glances, which he ignored with the practice of a foul-mouthed immortal who barely survived the rise of organized religion.

“Ah, fuck this,” he mumbled, now thoroughly irritated. Honestly, the nerve of that blasted grate to-

Oh.

Right beside his aching foot was the smallest cardboard box, and from within, two imploring sea-blue eyes were staring up at him with the most wretched plea of a mew he’d ever heard in his blessed life.

The kitten stared at him. He stared back.

With a beleaguered sigh – mostly for the benefit of anyone who may be listening – he crouched down and reached out a single finger. The kitten sniffed it curiously, ears and whiskers twitching, before booping it with its tiny pink nose.

It was grey, pinstriped like the ‘40s were still in fashion, and small enough to fit in the demon’s palm. Its eyes were open, and ears unfolded, both of which suggested, alongside the size, that this kitten was roughly two to three weeks old.

“Look at you, you pathetic thing,” he murmured as he rubbed two fingers over the tiny kitten’s head. The cat leaned into it, imploring the demon’s hand to his chin, and Crowley obliged. “You’re completely ridiculous, you know that? Crying away in a box? You think someone’s gonna come help you if you sit it out and wail?”

Despite his words, he spoke softly, as though to a scared child, and his ministrations were nothing but gentle.

“Ugh. Well.” Crowley tsked as he glanced around furtively and snapped to make sure no one was looking – as much for his reputation as for the miracle he was about to perform – and scooped up the box to teleport to his flat. His surroundings melted from the sharp sunlight of late summer in London to the cold barren minimalism of someone who doesn’t necessarily call the place he lives “home.”

Now caged in austere grey concrete, Crowley studied the silly little brute, who had curled up in a corner when the box was lifted. It meowed at him again, trembling with fear or confusion or curiosity, or all three.

“Hungry, little bugger?” Crowley guessed. Now, simply for the benefit of his own self-denial, he sighed again, deeply. “Fine, fine. Let’s deal with your issues, I guess. You’re a _pain.”_

The cat meowed again, perhaps in agreement. Who could say.

Anyone who observed the demon over the remainder of the afternoon would be forgiven for assuming that Crowley was perhaps a foster caretaker for cats on the regular. He knew their stages of development and anatomy well enough to determine the age and sex, he knew what to feed her and the accommodations she needed, he knew how to check her for various ailments common in strays and was able to ascertain her to be of stellar health.

The observer would be forgiven for this because it was entirely true.

They might not be forgiven for accusing him of it, though. He was a bloody demon, after all, and demons don’t spend their spare time taking care of stray kittens, abandoned by their mother to the muck of reality. That metaphor might be a bit too on-the-nose, even for him.

~

The bell above the door rung gently as Crowley stepped inside from the sweltering heat – honestly, if London could stick to its rainy stereotype, that’d be much appreciated, two days in a row was just insufferable – and he swung it closed behind him with a clang.

“Angel! You here?” he called as he swayed in, ignoring the two or three customers who were pretending to browse while mostly taking advantage of the miraculously cool temperatures (more customers was a small price to pay on days like these; antique books simply must remain in a temperature-controlled room, or so Aziraphale insisted).

“Ah, Crowley!” Aziraphale appeared from somewhere behind a towering tiered table of tomes Crowley knew to be Aziraphale’s space for outdated geography, tiny spectacles low on his nose and a bundle of yellowed papers tucked against his chest. “I was rather hoping you’d come by today.”

Crowley lifted his eyebrows in pleasant surprise. “Were you, now?”

“Yes! You really wouldn’t believe it, but that café on Regency Street finally fired that abysmal – er, poorly equipped chef they’ve had on hire for the past couple of years. I would most like to try it again with the new staff.”

The corner of the demon’s lips twitched up. “Wonder how the unfortunate sod got fired. How convenient that it might occur after he served you tomato slices microwaved instead of grilled.”

Aziraphale sniffed and turned to shuffle some books about in a way that didn’t seem to be accomplishing anything. “I haven’t the slightest as to your implications. Shall we?”

Crowley glanced to the customers milling about and grinned wide. “Give me a minute.” Without further ado, he ducked behind a bookcase and dropped to the floor in a coil of black sinewy snake before slithering across the rough floorboards. Fifty seconds, a thrown shoe, and some screaming later, Crowley extended back to his human form and miracled the shoe back to the man’s foot, grinning like a madman.

“Was that necessary, my dear?” Aziraphale commented disapprovingly.

“Don’t even pretend you don’t love it when I do that,” Crowley replied with a smirk. “Gets the customers out _and_ you get to see my beautiful, snake-y self.”

Aziraphale gave a drawn-out exhale, awkwardly draping the bundle in his arms over a stack of books. “You’ll never let me live that down, will you?”

“Of course not.”

A short while after, the demon and the angel found themselves seated in a beige diner with red-and-white checkered curtains, black-frame vintage portraits, and an overblown clock with Roman numerals that found themselves counting backward as soon as Crowley stepped through the door. It was _quaint_ and _kitschy._

Crowley watched Aziraphale as he moaned and groaned over his full English Breakfast – such a cliché – all the while commenting on how much better this new chef was, and oh the eggs are cooked to perfection, and oh Crowley you must try these beans they’re sublime.

“So, angel,” the demon said at one point, “I read about something interesting online.”

You see, Crowley had a problem. He also had a cat right now, back in his flat, probably making a mess of the place and meowing annoyingly, and this problem and this cat were one in the same. The goal to remove this problem was quite simple: pass the cat off to the angel and let him take care of her instead so he didn’t have to (and there’s no way he was taking her to a shelter where she might be abandoned again and waste all his hard work).

Very evil and diabolical, of course. Just a way to use the cat to bother his favorite angel is all.

Aziraphale tapped his lips with his napkin and frowned. “You know I don’t care for your gadgets, Crowley.”

The demon rolled his eyes. “Yes, I’m well aware. The thing is, I’ve read that there was a famous cat in Iowa who lived in a library. And ever since, there’s been a trend of libraries and bookshops and what-have-you of having a cat as like a – a mascot, of sorts.”

Aziraphale swallowed his bite of sausage and pursed his lips haughtily. “I don’t see what cats have to do with literary establishments.”

“Well, you know,” Crowley hedged, waving his hands about, “it’s like – comforting. Right? Books and tea and cats. That’s the whole thing. They go together.”

Aziraphale shrugged. “I suppose so. Is there a point to this?”

“Well,” Crowley drawled. “You should get a cat.”

Aziraphale’s eyebrows shot up. “And why, in Heaven’s name, would I want to let a ferocious feline anywhere near my precious books, to shed hair and claw bindings and – and do Lord knows what with the papyrus!”

Well. That was an unexpected reaction. Crowley leaned back in his cushy booth seat, causing the plastic to crinkle. “Er – ah, don’t like cats, then?”

“Of course, I like cats. They’re one of God’s creatures.” Aziraphale took an aggressive bite of egg. “Just not in my shop, and preferably belonging to other people.”

Crowley let out a low breath and reminded himself that he was a demon and did not rally to defend how wonderful and amazing cats are because demons don’t like cats, either. “Okay…and what if there was a cat that, er, didn’t do that? You could teach it. Would be…fun.”

“It’s just a trend, Crowley. You know I don’t do trends. Why bother?”

“Er. Cats. Seems like your thing, to have a grey little kitten. Take care of it and such.”

“Why grey? They come in many colors.”

Crowley shrugged, folding his arms. “Nothing in particular. Just. Ah. Lots of grey cats nowadays.” Hell, that was lame. “You sure you wouldn’t want to at least try it?”

Aziraphale huffed. “I don’t know why you are being so insistent on the matter. I really have no interest in having a cat in the bookshop. Or any animal.”

Crowley couldn’t help but grin, lifting his glasses enough to wink. “Except me, of course.”

“Yes, yes, except you, you foul serpent. Finish your orange juice and let’s go for a walk, yes?”

Crowley downed it in one go. “Angel. I’m wearing all black and it’s at least 27 degrees out there.”

“Well, you’ll make do, I imagine.”

Crowley sighed. He was doing a lot of that lately. “Fine.”

~

Crowley was nothing if not a persistent and practiced tempter and, as such, he was not likely to give it up after one go.

He tried again to persuade the angel from a number of angles over the next couple of weeks. He came up with dozens of reasons why Aziraphale might enjoy having a cat, everything from keeping him company to catching mice to scaring off customers with allergies. And yet, nothing swayed the stubborn angel.

“I just don’t see the need,” he insisted obstinately. “They have such short lifespans, anyway. Besides, you know I tend to get caught up in my books for days by accident. The poor thing would probably starve, and I wouldn’t even notice! Oh, dear.”

Crowley had to concede that was a very fair point.

All the while, Beatrice (so named because he was quite sure ‘his wits went halting off’ when he decided to rescue the brat) grew bigger and louder and nibbled leaves from no less than half of his plants (fine excuse to yell at the garden a bit, even if it wasn’t technically their fault). He bought her a cat tree and some toys and a thing of catnip – well, _bought_ is a strong word – and before long, his flat was a disaster of squeaky mice to step on, light grey hair all over his black sofa, and one tiny disaster child who he knew for a fact was flinging the dry food from her bowl while eating on purpose.

At least the litter box knew to clean itself. Crowley sure as Heaven wasn’t going to.

It was the most insufferable thing Crowley had ever had to deal with invading his space just after Hell itself. The damn thing slept on his bed, woke him up in the night with plaintive cries and nudges to the forehead, and curled up in his lap and purred like the happiest little thing in the damn world. Crowley spent more time petting her and playing with her than he did with Aziraphale, these days.

Good Someone, the cat was so demanding. Crowley really had no choice in the matter.

~

“I have to ask, my dear. Are you in a relationship?”

Crowley spluttered over his wine, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand as he glared at Aziraphale indignantly, cheeks flushing. “Am I _what?”_ he cried. “Why the Heaven would I – _what?”_

They were in the back room drinking the evening away. It’d been over a week since they’d seen each other, which would’ve been more than normal before the business of the prior August. As it was, they’d rarely gone more than a couple days without at least a phone call. Crowley felt a little bad, but he did not trust Beatrice alone at the flat for long stretches, and she was very distracting.

Aziraphale looked across at him sheepishly, a wispy smile on his lips. “It’s just…you know I can sense love, of course.”

“Yeah, and?”

“More specifically, I can tell when something in _particular_ is loved,” Aziraphale continued. “I can’t necessarily tell who does the loving, though. You recall in Tadfield-“

“The point, Aziraphale?”

“Well.” He blinked at Crowley, somewhere between confused and curious. “I couldn’t help but noticed you are, er, more loved than usual.”

Crowley lifted his eyebrows. There was so much to unpack in that statement, he wasn’t even sure where to start. After a few false starts and bits of mumbling, he finally managed, “Wha’d’you mean by that?”

“It’s just like it sounds. You have a usual amount that you are loved, as all entities do, and yours has, er, grown since we last met. So, I thought maybe you met someone or perhaps made a new friend.”

Crowley elected not to ask about this ‘usual amount he was loved’ for self-preservation reasons. It’s not like he was totally obvious; he just hated talking about it, and especially wasn’t going to address it tonight. “Right, that makes some amount of sense, I guess,” he replied slowly. “But I haven’t met anyone or anything of the sort. Satan, why would _that_ be your first assumption, anyway?”

Aziraphale looked a little too smug as he took a sip of his wine. “Might not have necessarily been my first thought. But…”

Crowley made a sound of offense. “You did that just to get a reaction out of me, you bastard!”

The angel sniffed primly. “I’m sure I-“

“Oh, don’t pull that!”

Aziraphale cracked and grinned at the demon’s exasperation. “Well. Perhaps I thought you might make that face you do when you’re embarrassed or caught off-guard.”

Crowley scoffed. “Don’t be stupid. I don’t make a _face.”_

“You do, my dear.”

“Do not.”

“Are we eight?”

“Low blow. I swear, between you and Beatrice, my reputation as the fierce demon I am is in shambles.”

Crowley didn’t realize what he’d said until he noticed Aziraphale’s surprised, and then very smug, expression. “So,” Aziraphale said with pursed lips, “who is Beatrice, then?”

Crowley sighed deep and long (not for the sake of anything this time, just because his soul needed to). He leaned back, crossed his legs, and mumbled something, draining his glass in one go.

“What was that? I didn’t quite catch it.”

Crowley slammed his empty glass down on the coffee table. “I said it’s the name of my _fucking_ _cat!”_

Aziraphale looked at him with wide eyes, mouth open just a bit, before gathering himself and _beaming_. “Oh, Crowley!”

“Shut it. Shut it shut it. Whatever you’re about to say with that expression, do not.”

Aziraphale placed a hand over his heart, looking soft and far too endeared. It was humiliating as fuck. “Crowley, you have a cat and the cat loves you! That’s why the love – oh! Oh, that’s so sweet, my dear.”

“It’s not sweet! Bloody feline is a menace and a pain in the arse!” He squinted at the angel. “You two would get along!”

Aziraphale continued to smile at him as though the demon hadn’t said a thing, taking a dainty, pleasant sip. “When were you planning on introducing me?”

Crowley folded his arms and sprawled himself further across the sofa. “You’re going to gang up on me, I just know it. Oh, this was a mistake. All of it. Everything.”

“Dear, I don’t know why you’re so embarrassed. It’s just a cat.”

“Not a cat,” he corrected, waving his finger in Aziraphale’s general direction. “Cats at least have fangs and some occult vibes in October. This is a _kitten_. A tiny, mewling, pathetic kitten who thinks my shins are scratching posts.”

Aziraphale chuckled. “You can pretend to dislike her all you want, Benedick, but…”

“Oi! Don’t attack me with my own Shakespeare reference! That’s just cruel.”

Aziraphale regarded Crowley for a moment fondly, long enough for the demon to squirm a bit and move to refill his glass. Finally, the angel asked, “Is it at least a black cat? To fit your aesthetic and all.”

The demon made a noncommittal grunt.

“Ah, wait.” Aziraphale smiled conspiratorially. “Let me guess. It’s grey, isn’t it?”

Crowley groaned and ran a hand over his face.

~

“She’s such a darling!”

“Stop, you’ll spoil her, angel.”

“Hush, she’s not one of your plants for you to berate. Look at her, she’s so sweet and soft! Oh, she’s purring!”

_“Traitor.”_

“What was that?”

“Nothing. Not talking to you.”

“Hmm…you know, Crowley, maybe I _should_ get a cat for the bookshop. A grey one. Know any in particular?”

“…”

“Crowley?”

“…No. Don’t know any that are…available.”

“…”

“Ugh, do _not_ smile at me like that, I swear to Someone! Besides, pets aren’t allowed in this building! I’m breaking the rules!”

“Ah, yes, how demonic of you to rescue a stray kitten and give it a home and love it.”

“Angel-“

_“Mew.”_

“Ugh, no one asked you, Beatrice.”


End file.
